Alabama's Landon Dickerson Will Miss College Football Playoff With Knee Injury
University of Alabama coach Nick Saban told ESPN's Chris Low that starting center Landon Dickerson will miss the College Football Playoff. An MRI on Dicerson's knee showed ligament damage after an injury suffered in Saturday night's SEC Championship Game.
The Outland Trophy finalist got hurt on the Crimson Tide's final touchdown play in Alabama's 52-46 win over Florida and was carted off, not being able to put any weight on his left leg.
"He's got great leadership," Alabama coach Nick Saban said earlier this month. "He's got a great personality. Plays with a lot of toughness. Really somebody that I think has made a tremendous impact on our team in a very positive way. Sets a great example in terms of his leadership. He's smart, he makes a lot of line calls. I think he helps the guys around him play better. So it's been a really, really positive thing all the way around. His performance has been very consistent and he's played very well all year long as well."
Dickerson has arguably been the Crimson Tide's best offensive lineman this year as the coaching staff has given him a 91.0 overall blocking grade. Before Saturday, he was credited with zero sacks and only one quarterback pressure.
Moving forward, the Crimson Tide have options to fill in for Dickerson.
Redshirt senior Chris Owens or Darrian Dalcourt could come off the bench or the coaching staff could elect to slide Emil Ekiyor Jr. from right guard to center.
To know what Dickerson means to the Alabama program, one could just look to the team's reaction when he was being loaded onto the cart. The bench cleared and every player came on the field to show their support.
"I think he’s probably one of the most popular guys on our team,” Saban said after the win over the Gators. “He’s got great leadership qualities. I don’t know anybody on our team that doesn’t really like him, and I think that was demonstrated by how everybody reacted to him getting injured."
